Just wondering if there is a HDD based player out there that is more sophisticated than the CDR-HD1500 in terms of storing different types of music together, and/or playlists. I like the idea of a redbook .wav file storage device for audio. It's also not easy to find the CDR-HD1500 for sale anywhere since it is so old. Is there anything that compares or improves on the older Yamaha CDR-HD1500?

thanks in advance,

P.S. I suppose one could use a laptop or PC with an external HDD...but it would most certainly need to have digital output. At least a laptop/PC would have quite the interface. Still, it would be nice to have a more sophisticated CDR-HD1500 type player out there.

Just wondering if there is a HDD based player out there that is more sophisticated than the CDR-HD1500 in terms of storing different types of music together, and/or playlists. I like the idea of a redbook .wav file storage device for audio. It's also not easy to find the CDR-HD1500 for sale anywhere since it is so old. Is there anything that compares or improves on the older Yamaha CDR-HD1500?

thanks in advance,

P.S. I suppose one could use a laptop or PC with an external HDD...but it would most certainly need to have digital output. At least a laptop/PC would have quite the interface. Still, it would be nice to have a more sophisticated CDR-HD1500 type player out there.

I am also looking for a similar thing. It looks like the CDR-1500 will be discontinued as I cant find it at any of the well known internet dealers.
The CDR-1500 is very convienient as I dont have to use a PC/Laptop.
Too bad it is gone or probably gone.

I think there are other things you can use for this purpose, but I like the simplicity of the Yamaha CDR-HD1500 component. With a 400 GB hdd upgrade, I'd have more than enough room. I think this style of component is not popular because:

a) Units that do this type of thing are more geared towards multi-media such as video and streaming, rather than ripping and storing.
b) People are satisfied with less storage when they use MP3's.....I like the mass storage capability to store full redbook cd copies of my cd's in wav files.

Hopefully I'll find something out there. If worse came to worse, I suppose I could make an HTPC for this purpose, but again, I'd need a display. I just want a simple front display showing folders and playlists etc.

I guess I should feel pretty lucky to get the cdr-1500 when I did if they are no longer available. I was feeling like I jumped the gun since it won't play SACD's but for recording regular cd's it does an outstanding job.

I am currently building a PC for this purpose. It isn't very expensive if you are building for this sole purpose. Also, they make vacuum fluorescent displays for HTPC's as well. A feature that is important for me, and one of my primary reasons for going this route, is the ability to have mirrored hard drives. This allows for redundancy, so as to avoid literally hundreds of hours of rip time in the event the drive fails. This option is also great for future upgrades/repairs, which can become a nuisance for this type of device.

Though I am an employee of Magnolia Home Theater, the views and opinions I express on this forum are those of my own and not my employer.

An HTPC/Media PC is certainly an option for this. I was hoping to keep build/buy costs down and also keep electricity/power usage down. I guess if the right components are used it could be down without using too much juice.

I am currently building a PC for this purpose. It isn't very expensive if you are building for this sole purpose. Also, they make vacuum fluorescent displays for HTPC's as well. A feature that is important for me, and one of my primary reasons for going this route, is the ability to have mirrored hard drives. This allows for redundancy, so as to avoid literally hundreds of hours of rip time in the event the drive fails. This option is also great for future upgrades/repairs, which can become a nuisance for this type of device.

I have a ReadyNAS duo NAS drive connected to my home network which Itunes and SONOS access for music. The ReadyNAS has two hard drives and some form of RAID (the second drive is only used as a backup of the first). I also sync a FreeAgent Go drive periodically and keep that backup copy off-site.

I have a ReadyNAS duo NAS drive connected to my home network which Itunes and SONOS access for music. The ReadyNAS has two hard drives and some form of RAID (the second drive is only used as a backup of the first). I also sync a FreeAgent Go drive periodically and keep that backup copy off-site.

Those are a great option as well! You would still need a computer to rip and play music though. Buying both of them could get costly.

Though I am an employee of Magnolia Home Theater, the views and opinions I express on this forum are those of my own and not my employer.

An HTPC/Media PC is certainly an option for this. I was hoping to keep build/buy costs down and also keep electricity/power usage down. I guess if the right components are used it could be down without using too much juice.

Computers use very low amounts of current. Especially one for this purpose. Also, costs start very low. You won't need a very powerful machine, and you can make incremental upgrades down the road if you so choose.

Though I am an employee of Magnolia Home Theater, the views and opinions I express on this forum are those of my own and not my employer.

It seems like this is component that got left in the cold by the manufactuers.

It would seem with lower HDD prices and computer power now, a stand alone version of this would be great for many people......I would love to replace my 200 disc CD jukebox, but right now, nothing compares to it in sound quality and ease of use. I have an iPod dock for my Denon AVR, tried to use USB input on Denon, as well as network audio on it, and nothing works as well as jukebox.

I have a Dell ZinoHD that I bought for the main idea of a music server, but I have yet to find a front-end and control system that is slick and bulletproof.

I would love to stack another black box in my system that has a CD player/burner, a 300+ gig HDD, and the ability to play without firing up the TV, but has a great looking front end if I did want to see album art and track/disc names.

I've seen things you wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.

It seems like this is component that got left in the cold by the manufactuers.

It would seem with lower HDD prices and computer power now, a stand alone version of this would be great for many people......I would love to replace my 200 disc CD jukebox, but right now, nothing compares to it in sound quality and ease of use. I have an iPod dock for my Denon AVR, tried to use USB input on Denon, as well as network audio on it, and nothing works as well as jukebox.

I have a Dell ZinoHD that I bought for the main idea of a music server, but I have yet to find a front-end and control system that is slick and bulletproof.

I would love to stack another black box in my system that has a CD player/burner, a 300+ gig HDD, and the ability to play without firing up the TV, but has a great looking front end if I did want to see album art and track/disc names.

Exactly. Basically an improved CDR-HD1500 including higher capacity HDD support over 750 GB so you can store full bitrate wav files or equivalent.

As nice as these can be, the one fatal flaw is the single hard-drive design. If it dies, you get to rip all your music again. The bigger the hard drive, the more music, the bigger the problem. I wonder if it is possible to develop a purpose-built linux distro that would function with basic controls and only a front VF display. That would be ideal.

Though I am an employee of Magnolia Home Theater, the views and opinions I express on this forum are those of my own and not my employer.

As nice as these can be, the one fatal flaw is the single hard-drive design. If it dies, you get to rip all your music again. The bigger the hard drive, the more music, the bigger the problem. I wonder if it is possible to develop a purpose-built linux distro that would function with basic controls and only a front VF display. That would be ideal.

There is a free program to copy all your files onto another drive. It's called "Yamaha CDR-HD1500 Assistant". You have to insert the new drive into the Yamaha and format it it first. Then using this utility you connect both to a PC and copy all the data from one drive to the other. I've used it, and it works. Check post 8 in this thread to download:

There is a free program to copy all your files onto another drive. It's called "Yamaha CDR-HD1500 Assistant". You have to insert the new drive into the Yamaha and format it it first. Then using this utility you connect both to a PC and copy all the data from one drive to the other. I've used it, and it works. Check post 8 in this thread to download:

This would appear to to solve that issue, thanks for the clarification. Is this released and supported by Yamaha?

I believe it was released by an individual, not Yamaha. But it does work, it worked on mine even though I did not have the firmware version he claims is needed. I had an older version, and it worked just fine.

I'm still looking around for a CDR-HD1500 to up and try out. I simply want to store all my CD's and add any future CD's or other music lossless and play this music on a 200 GB or larger HD and play the music back through at least one, two or more music systems or zones in the house.

Is the CDR-HD1500 still a useful option to play music stored on hard disk? Basically a hdd connected to a DAC and pre-amp with some navigation is all I need. All the other stuff seems interesting with it's wireless internet, but I mainly just want to store and playback music all from one storage place. I do have a wireless internet connection and router. If I have a PC I can use to rip CD's and other music, what else could I use to connect to a HDD full of music and send an analog R & L or Digital signal to an av or stereo receiver? Basically, what are the options today (an update of this discussion) and how do they compare to the CDR-HD1500? I think I could find a CDR-HD1500 for $400-$650 Canadian.

If I picked up a unit with a 200 GB HDD, what is the largest HDD size that I can upgrade it to and is it difficult? People say 1 or 2TB even but the only IDE drives I can see available are 500GB. That is probably enough for me now at least. I don't have 600 + CD's anyways. I can do the upgrade technically but I'm wondering about the HDD formatting etc so as to be compatible with the CDR-HD1500. What is the HDD that comes with the unit? I imagine I must use an IDE HDD. To bad you can't connect 2 HDD....one external.

I'm still looking around for a CDR-HD1500 to up and try out. I simply want to store all my CD's and add any future CD's or other music lossless and play this music on a 200 GB or larger HD and play the music back through at least one, two or more music systems or zones in the house.

Is the CDR-HD1500 still a useful option to play music stored on hard disk? Basically a hdd connected to a DAC and pre-amp with some navigation is all I need. All the other stuff seems interesting with it's wireless internet, but I mainly just want to store and playback music all from one storage place. I do have a wireless internet connection and router. If I have a PC I can use to rip CD's and other music, what else could I use to connect to a HDD full of music and send an analog R & L or Digital signal to an av or stereo receiver? Basically, what are the options today (an update of this discussion) and how do they compare to the CDR-HD1500? I think I could find a CDR-HD1500 for $400-$650 Canadian.

If I picked up a unit with a 200 GB HDD, what is the largest HDD size that I can upgrade it to and is it difficult? People say 1 or 2TB even but the only IDE drives I can see available are 500GB. That is probably enough for me now at least. I don't have 600 + CD's anyways. I can do the upgrade technically but I'm wondering about the HDD formatting etc so as to be compatible with the CDR-HD1500. What is the HDD that comes with the unit? I imagine I must use an IDE HDD. To bad you can't connect 2 HDD....one external.

There is one serious flaw in most devices like HD1500 - they only have one disk and do not have any backup option. When you have large capacity disk (like 1-2TB) you always need either fault tolerant solution or do regular backups. Last thing you want is to repeat ripping process all over again when hard disk dies. And it will - life span of modern disks is about 3 years.

There is one serious flaw in most devices like HD1500 - they only have one disk and do not have any backup option. When you have large capacity disk (like 1-2TB) you always need either fault tolerant solution or do regular backups. Last thing you want is to repeat ripping process all over again when hard disk dies. And it will - life span of modern disks is about 3 years.

Actually, we find that the average lifespan of a hard drive is well over 5 years. Which makes sense when you consider that most drives come with 5 year warranties these days. Of course being an avaerage, some do fail sooner.

Another thing to consider is that a lot of PC's are on 24/7, as opposed to my 1500, which is on maybe 10 to 15 hours a week.

Another thing to consider is that a lot of PC's are on 24/7, as opposed to my 1500, which is on maybe 10 to 15 hours a week.

Most storage vendors recommend replacing drives in arrays every three years as a preventive measure. And every On/Off cycle increases chances for drive to fail more than few additional hours of run time.

Warranty period has almost nothing to do with reliability of the drive, as cost of failure for you is significantly higher than cost of its replacement under warranty for vendor.

Most storage vendors recommend replacing drives in arrays every three years as a preventive measure. And every On/Off cycle increases chances for drive to fail more than few additional hours of run time.

Warranty period has almost nothing to do with reliability of the drive, as cost of failure for you is significantly higher than cost of its replacement under warranty for vendor.

A decent array can handle a drive failure without issue. Our current servers would have to have 4 drives fail at once for there to be an issue.

Power cycles will reduce the life of most electronics, but I don't think it's enough to offset the difference between being on 8760 hours a year, compared to 500 to 600 hours a year.

Here I am again......still looking for something. Spent the morning with the Dell Zino trying to get things to work like I want them, with a Denon AVR or TiVo HD as control center. Nothing works like what I want.

Anything new?

I've seen things you wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.